My American Dream
Diego Martinez
I grew up in Mexico in a lower middle class family. Being the
youngest of thirteen siblings, I often had to fight for the things
that I wanted for myself not to share. After seeing most of my
brothers and sisters leave our hometown to achieve their
American Dream at seventeen years old it was my “turn” to
leave for “El Norte” and seek my American Dream only to
realize ten years later that my dream was just that.
When I was growing up in a small town in Mexico, all I saw
was my parents working so hard to sustain our family. My
father was a truck driver, and at times I would not see him for
weeks. My mother had to make sure that my siblings and I
had something to eat at the end of the day. Most of the times
she played the mother and father role. Since I can remember,
my mother would always tell me to go to school and get a good
education. But the fact that my parents were always busy gave
me the opportunity to go to school but not to study—only to
play with my friends and to get bad grades; and I really took
advantage of that.
Since I was about 8 years old, my dream was to go to the
U.S., work, and earn a lot of money to buy a truck. Some of the
people that had returned to my hometown of Union de Tula
Jalisco, Mexico after being in the U.S. for several years had